mrdee

Quite a bit of work, and quite a bit of equipment, ingredients and especially time needed to make this one, but it is an effort which is well worth it in the end, since it will be a great base for sauces and soups. This method is to make a large quantity of stock, and it is a, not the recipe for vegetable stock, as it can be made in numerous ways. Equipment: 2 large pans (15 to 20 litres) 1 oven tray 1 pointed sieve 1 bowl-shaped sieve 1 washed and wetted passing cloth (or, if not available, a clean and wetted tea towel can be used). 1 container with lid 1 skimmer 1 large ladle 1 cutting board Ingredients: 40 grammes of butter or oil 500 gr of onion 500 gr white of leek 250 gr celeriac 100 gr fennel 500 gr tomato 200 gr mushrooms fresh parsley 2 bay leaves 3 gr thyme 5 gr broken pepper corns 5 gr charvil 10 litres of cold water 0.5 litre of white wine Method: Wash and clean the vegetables and cut into small pieces. In the oven tray in which you put the butter or oil, gently stew the vegetables, making sure the colour does not change. Before vegetables can discolour, remove from oven, stop the stewing with the white wine and add some of the cold water. Fill one of the pans with the cold water and add the contents of the oven tray. Slowly begin to heat the liquid, until just below boiling point (about 90 degrees Centigrade). While the stock is absorbing the vegetable flavours and aromas, remove the foam from the top with a skimmer and repeat this. Let the stock absorb for about one hour (See warnings below) Put the wet straining cloth into the pointed strainer and put the bowl-shaped sieve on top and strain the stock. Let the stock cool off in a cool place (not in the fridge). Keep the cooled off stock in the fridge (must be covered) or freeze it in equal portions for later use. Warnings: Never let the stock boil, or it will fail. Take the foam off the top of the stock carefully, if done too vigorously it could make the stock fail. Give the stock time to cool off before putting it into the fridge or freezer. Rinse the straining cloth/tea towel before use to prevent remainders of soap to be present. Should the stock not be clear enough, you can add a vegetable clarifier (can be bought in a specialised herb and spice shop). Result: If you have done everything right, the stock should be crystal clear.

Right then, Velma, as for your first question, I am not 100% sure, as a musician, I obviously know a calabash or gourd, as the outside is often used for making instruments (Tanpura, Sitar, Vina, Cabassa and more), however, I cannot say I am familiar with its taste or culinary uses. I have read, though, that they contain a lot of toxins, toxins of the nature that can cause stomach ulcers, and that have even even been known to kill people but I guess people in the regions where the calabashes are often used in cooking know what they are doing in order to keep those toxins at bay). So, I'm afraid I will not be able to answer your question. About the spinach: do add some by all means, but be careful with the amount, as we are still talking vegetable soup, and if the spinach becomes too dominant, it would begin to taste like spinach soup. So, add a little bit of spinach, but chop it very thinly too. About your question for vegetable stock, I shall post that in a minute in its own separate topic. I will also, at your request, keep the recipes coming, but now nanna's hosting is up and running you will be able to find lots of yummy recipes on her blog, which can be found here, but I must say, it is only a beginning, it is still being worked on and will be expanding bit by bit.

Very interesting, velma.I did not realise you could put a URL down that pointed to a whole album.Thank you very much for the tip.(I'll pay you back with a crate of 1 day old beer) .Well, I don't mind my Scotch with ice.**Takes the glass and takes a sip** mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. perfect, you chose a good make too, what a full aroma and flavour.Cheers, Velma.

Well, Velma, first of all, thank you for the congratulations. Then, if you are going to wet the babies' heads, please don't do it with a bottle of 4 day old beer. Also, if you are planning to do so, mine is a whisky, please (Scotch, of course). Later on today, there will also be individual close-up pictures of the puppies both in mine and nanna's Galleries, which reminds me I need to ask you a question: "When I uploaded the pictures to my Gallery, I was not sure what to do, for a while I had the idea of also embedding the pictures in my post, but: 1)There were 14 of them (a lot of work for a lazy so and so like me) and 2)If I had done this, would that have been appropriate and not against the Xisto rules?", I had the idea, because I thought the pictures would have stood out more when embedded in my post rather than my Gallery (It seems some people are not 100% sure how to browse the Gallery, and, in a post, you can look at all pictures, rather than having to switch from one to the other). Anyway, that aside, Dido is an excellent mum to her babies, feeding them and moving them around so everyone gets their turn, and also keeping her puppies nice and warm. Dido also has no problem with letting us handling the puppies, like the sweet animal realises we are doing it to help her. And, of course, I will (or nanna will) post regular updates on how the puppies progress (including pictures, and, no, there is no picture available of me checking the birth of the last puppy in my birthday suit ). We will keep doing this until the day we have to let them go , which would be December the 27th, it will be really sad to sell them and see them go, but, at least, 3 are staying in the family, my son said he wanted a chocolate one too. And little Paige, my little granddaughter, is over the moon with the beautiful puppy called Lady which will join her at her home in some weeks time. So, watch out for the next issue.

Hello to Dyson and Xuoxo. You are both very welcome on the Xisto forums. It would, of course be good if you told the members here a bit about yourself, things as your interests, hobbies,, wheher or not you have a website, or whether you intend to have a website hosted here, and more similar things. You are certainly going to be able to have discussions about a wide range of topics here, and you will also find lots of smart and knowledgeable people here, who will usually be able to help you with any problems or queries you might have. Dyson, you also said "I want to do my bit for this forum", which is great, but this forum could also do a lot for you, apart from the aforementioned things about the discussions and the knowledgeable people, you can also get your very good hosting space here, with lots of features, no advertisements on your website and completely free, you "pay" for your web space by posting in the forums and accumulating MyCents credits, which you can then use like real money to keep your web hosting going. Anyway, I hope you will both have a great time here and have lots of fun.

All the above posts contain excellent advice, all programs mentioned do the job, all in their own way, of course, and, after all, everybody has their own preference to the antivirus, spyware and malware programs they use. However, here is another real killer which does a very detailed search and seems to look where the other ones have sopped. Simply go to the microsoft website and download the latest version of Windows Malicious Software Removal Tool. Then (it might be a good idea to do that before going to bed and letting the computer do the job overnight, as, depending on how much there is on your hard disk drive, it might take quite a few hours), reboot your machine, and start it up again in Safe Mode by rapidly tapping the F8 key while the computer boots up. (It is very important you start up your machine in Safe Mode). Once your machine has booted up, run the Windows Malicious Software Removal Tool and tell it to do a full scan. Then, leave he machine to it and when the program has finished remember this might take several hours depending on the amount of data on your hard disk) you will se a list of the malware that was removed (if any). You will notice it often removes pieces of very stubborn malware that other programs sometimes overlook. Good luck.

As a follow-up to my previous post, called "Maybe a day late, but....", I want to give you a recipe for a lovely vegetable soup, this time a soup with chunks of vegetables in it, where no mixing/blending the soup is involved. It would be best to go through my initial explanation in the othe topic again, as there are two kinds of soups: Soups that will be blended. Soups that will not be blended. This one here falls into the latter category, so, this time, instead of stewing the vegetables, we are going to boil them. Since the soup is called "vegetable soup", it is obvious that vegetables should dominate the soup, so use lots of them and lots of different vegetables. Another tip: Always chop your vegetables very fine for this kind of soup, because every single piece of vegetable releases its own taste, so, if, for example, you cut a carrot into big chunks, every chunk of carrot is going to give you the carrot taste from four sides of the chunk, while thin strips or little pieces will all release their tastes individually, also spreading them all over your soup. OK, here we go: Ingredients: You basically have a choice of vegetables, but most of these should go into your soup: An onion. A potato. A courgette. Five carrots. Four leeks. A piece of celery. A tomato. Vegetable stock (two cubes or 1 dessert spoonful if using paste). Chopped parsley. Pepper and salt. Two litres of water. Vermicelli (optional). Method: Chop all your vegetables into small pieces. (As in the other post, I always like to use a potato in soups for the extra taste and because it binds your soup nicely together). A tip on chopping the carrot: cut a thin strip off, then put the rest onto the flat side you have made, it will be much easier and quicker to cut the carrot. Then cut the strips into small pieces. When all the vegetables have been chopped (do NOT do the tomato yet), put them into 2 litres of water, add the vegetable stock and bring to the boil, then let simmer for 30 to 40 minutes. Just before the soup is ready, cut the tomato into small pieces, but DO remove the seeds, as tomato seeds release a sour/bitter taste which would not be appropriate in this kind of soup. The reason why you have to leave the tomato for last is because it would boil to pieces, and don't forget you taste with your eyes too. When you have put in the tomaro, add the vermicelli (optional), vermicelli is small pieces of pasta, it gives that nice extra pasta taste in soups. Then finish off your soup with chopped parsley, spice with pepper and salt, and, have a nice meal.

Halloween might be a day behind us, however, a recipe for pumpkin soup never goes amiss, especially if it is a real "yummy yummy" pumpkin soup. Before I start with the recipe, I want to give a tip (a very important one) on a general rule when making soup. Here it goes: When making a soup you are going to blend, always stew your vegetables first. When making a soup with bits of vegetable in it, just boil your vegetables. The reason for that is the way vegetables release their taste and aroma.When there are bits of vegetables present in the soup, the vegetables nicely, slowly and equally keep releasing their taste and aroma. In a blended soup, where the vegetables have been mangled, the taste has already to be present, and it will also be retained, so the stewing of the vegetables releases all the taste and aroma in one go, and then, at the end, the soup can be blended and retains the full vegetable taste. If you do not stew your vegetables in a blended soup, you will basically end up with a pond, in which your vegetables have drowned, and you will have a dull, watery soup that is low in taste. Any way, for the pumpkin soup, here it goes: You need: 1 or 2 pumpkins (according to taste). 1 onion. 1 potato. 2 leeks. 2 oranges (optional). 1 cube (or if using paste) 1 dessert spoonful of vegetable stock. 2 litres of water. 10 centiliters of cream some parsley, preferably freshly chopped. The method: Take the flesh out of the pumpkin(s) and cut into pieces. Peel the potato and cut into pieces. (The potato, like the other vegetables, aids the taste, but also provides some extra "binding" for the soup to make it somewhat thicker). Chop up the onion. Use the white of the leeks, cut into pieces. In a large pan, melt some butter (or margarine or (olive) oil). Put in all the vegetables, spice with some pepper and salt and let them stew for 5 to 6 minutes, stirring occasionally. When the vegetables are ready, fill the pan with water to cover your vegetables (takes about 2 litres). Bring your water to the boil, add the vegetable stock and let the soup simmer for 35 to 40 minutes. When you start this (this is optional, but, in my opinion, makes a lovely difference), squeeze out 2 oranges in your soup, as pumpkins are very sweet, and the oranges will add a little bit of acidity to your soup. When the soup is finished, blend everything, stir in your cream and finish off with sprinkling the parsley into your soup. Please let me know how you get on.

OK then, here is the complete report: At about 10.15 in the morning, Dido was getting really restless, panting away. At 10.30, nanna said to me "There is something hanging from her bum" , of course I knew what it was right away and I took her straight into the whelping box. All of a sudden, the puppy came out, and Dido was a bit indecisive and a bit unsure (after all, it was her first ever experience of giving birth), so I helped remove the sack from the puppy, checked its breathing, rubbed it dry a bit, and then left it with the mum to deal with the placenta and the cord. I had immediately seen it was a boy, so I told nanna to put on record: "One boy, black". However, when the second puppy was on its way, and I gave the first one to nanna to have it out of the way, nanna remarked: "He is not black, he is chocolate", which I then saw, because, for the puppies' sake, I had kept the light in the whelping box to a minimum. This, of course, brings us straight into the birth of the second puppy, which was at 12.20 pm, one hour and 50 minutes after the first one. I could not believe what I was seeing, as the puppy came out, I noticed it was white, it was also MASSIVE, it looked like there were two puppies coming out at once. I just opened the sack, and Dido handled the rest much better and quicker this time, and yes, what did we have? A beautiful golden labrador girl, looking a bit like a polar bear cub. Another hour later, at 1.25 pm, once again, smooth and quick, a chocolate girl dog came out, and Dido needed no assistance from me. Then, things started to go quicker: half an hour later, at 1.55 pm, a black boy dog appeared, all I had to do was keep an eye out to see if everything was normal, but Dido did a great job again. Time between births seemed to be getting shorter all the time, at 2.22 pm a golden coloured boy was born, much smaller than the first golden one, and with a more brownish/ginger tint of coat. Then, 23 minutes later, at 2.45 pm, we had another black boy dog. Things got a bit slower again, it took until 4.10 pm before another black dog was born, a girl this time. I was not sure whether that was the end of it, Dido was still panting a bit, but the whole thing seemed over, although I had some suspicions in the back of my mind there could be (a) puppy(ies) left inside her, however, nothing further happened. So, when everything seemed to have calmed down, at 9 o'clock at night, I decided to go and get a shower. I got out of the shower, and started drying myself off, but, no sooner had I put the towel to my body, or nanna called me down, saying another one was coming. I ran downstairs (didn't even have time to dress ), quickly drying myself as good as I could on my way down, and went straight to the whelping box. And yes, 914 pm, another puppy was appearing, I had to help and gice a little tug to let the placenta come with the puppy, and Dido started doing her job again, only, this time, being a bit rough with the puppy, throwing her all over the place while dealing with the sack and cord, I was a bit concerned Dido would reject the puppy. Thankfully, that was not the case, and another perfectly healthy black girl dog was born. (The only thing is, just before the birth of the last puppy, nanna had just changed the bedding in the whelping box). Never mind though, we have now a nice list of labrador puppies on offer: A chocolate boy, weighed 400 grammes (We are keeping this and calling it Gaston) A golden girl, weighed 500 grammes, this one my daughter is keeping, calling it Lady. A chocolate girl, which weighed 400 grammes. A black boy, weighed 400 grammes. A golden boy, weighed 400 grammes. A black boy, weighed 500 grammes. A chocolate girl, weighed 400 grammes. A black girl, weighed 400 grammes. So, we hve 4 boys and 4 girls, black, 3 chocolate and 2 golden.The funny thing is, Dido and Lucky (the dad) are both black labradors. The vet said it is practically a miracle, eight puppies, and the three possible labrador colours. Anyway, I am going to put photos in my Gallery now, come and have a look there after you read this.

At 10.30 this morning a healthy boy puppy was born.We are now waiting for the rest.

It is 7.40 the next morning now.After a pretty much sleepless night, Dido is still panting, but there is not much more that seems to be happening.There does not seem to be any attempt at beginningf to push, or no getting at her vulva, just the restlessness and the panting.But nanna is going to pop round the vet's surgery when it opens at 9 o'clock to get some further advice.At about 10.30 this morning things will have been going on for a whole 24 hours.

Hi again, sheepdog.It is now nearly 10 pm, and I have been looking out of the window a few times to see if there was no big bird with long legs with a parcel in its beak flying around, but no luck so fa.I guess the only option is to just keep waiting.Thank you for your advice so far.

I have the impression it is going to happen soon.Dido has been panting since 10.30 this morning, and it seems there are very light, irregular contractions.It is 4 in the afternoon now, so we are quietly monitoring her from a distance in her whelping box.

Attention: Update to the previous Sorry about having to do it like this, but I could no longer edit the previous post, so here it goes: I have now managed to adjust the URLs and the email address in the SQL file, with which I updated the MySQL database. However, I still have a few concerns: Although all the data and the files seem to be in place, I am concerned about the fact Wodpress might not be installed Also, the URL is followed by /# in the browser bar, is that just a detail or does it need correcting If it needs to be corrected, how am I supposed to do this? In order to be a bit more specific, especially to point 2: The URL to the site is "http://nannaskitchen.co.cc/;, but when I type it into the address bar, it comes out as "http://nannaskitchen.co.cc/;, although, both seem to work. I am a bit concerned about the "#" bit, so, if anyone can help, please get in touch, also about whether or not Wordpress is installed. Thank you in advance.

This one is tricky to explain, but nevertheless a very difficult one for me, so I would love to get help on this one. I have just set up hosting for nanna, and I have backups of her files on the previous hosting. It concerns a Wordpress blog. I copied all the files to her hosting space (her new hosting space, that is) and adjusted the database login details. When I opened the site in my browser, I saw the text and (sort of) layout appear, however, without any graphics. When I clicked a link, I got "Google Chrome cannot find the page at ...... (The old URL of her blog, which no longer exists)". Obviously, my first thought was "Oh my goodness, I will have to go through all those files to change all appearances of the old URL to the current URL". (And I probably might still have to). However, then, it also dawned on me "I have set up the database (via the SQL), I have copied all the files, but I have not installed Wordpress on the hosting yet", so I went on to Fantastico to do so, however, after I had entered everything and pressed the button to start installing, Fantastico returned this: Of course, my main concern is now: will I have to remove all the original Wordpress files after all the work I went through? And secondly, if I do, how do I get all the right data from the old Wordpress Blog in place? Has anyone got an answer how I should go about things, and in what order? Please help, as I would not want to have to start completely from scratch again. I will be ever so much obliged if someone could help me.

You are quite welcome, Sheepdog.Don't worry, you have your own skills, you can't know everything.All the rest is what this forum is here for.Glad your problem got sorted.

So, Sheepdog,your question is not 100% clear to me, however, I have given something a try, done what I thought you mean.Please let me know if the added picture is the one you were referring to, and if this is roughly the size you wish.

Well, sheepdog,"Am I sure I have never done this before?" I would say "yes and no" I have a confession to make:Many moons ago, I used to work for a vet, and although I am not a qualified veterinarian surgeon myself, I did learn a lot there, and, yes, I did assist in a few Caesarian sections.That is probably as far as the "yes" goes, meaning I have some previous knowledge of things, and I have seen it happen (although not the "natural" way) and I do know a thing or two about animal care, pre and postoperative care and pre and postnatal care.However, for the "no" bit:Although I have had quite a few dogs in my life, I have never had one that got pregnant, so, there has never been a canine birth in my family.Also, like I said, my work for the vet was a long time ago, and people tend to forget things (especially me ).The thing is, although I have helped delivering puppies (by surgical means), I was still in the presence of a qualified and experienced professional medic, so I was properly instructed on what to do next.I do remember the things to do once the puppies are out of the mother's womb, but, it might be quite possible the nerves step in a little bit (I won't use the word "panic", as that would be taking things a bit too far...).However, it is always good to get some proper advice from here and there too, for example, you have quite a bit of experience in the field, nanna has spoken to the vet too, so if we can now combine that with my knowledge, we should be on our way to have some great, healthy and lovely puppies.That does not, of course, alter the fact, that we are very grateful for your advice and input.Keep watching this space.

Thank you for your reply, sheepdog.Yes, I agree: I would rather have 6 happy healthy puppies than 12 that are constantly struggling.It does not really matter to me what colour they are (although I must say I do have a slight preference for black labbies, but I like the golden and chocolate ones too), but it is not uncommon for two black labs to produce a golden one or a chocolate one among their litter.I even saw a litter of puppies from a golden retriever and a black labrador and all of them were black.I don't think our Dido is from a hunting bloodline, and it does seem the fireworks are making her somewhat nervous, unfortunately, they will now go on until at least Bonfire Night (5th of November).Her temperature is still normal at the moment, and I must say she still looks her usual, happy, normal self.Yes, it is true that the need for a Caesarian is often provoked by the owners (quite often with the best of intentions, but ignorance is bliss, as they say), and we are trying to leave Dido alone as much as possible and not to fuss over her, obviously, during birth, things will have to be monitored from time to time.So, we are waiting for things to evolve and we will be updating you (and others) through the forum here.

On my machine the Facebook front page (when not logged in) looks smooth and normal (as in the attached image), while on nanna's machine, the same page appears all distorted, with text and images in the wrong places, and colours missing from the main body (see second attachment).We both have Google Chrome 15.0 (the latest version) as our browser and we both use Windows & Ultimate and exactly the same machine. As you can see in the image on the left, everything is smooth, with a gradient colour in the background, mobile phone nicely to the left and text normally formatted.However, on the image on the right you see, the mobile phone isn't even there (sometimes it is, although in the wrong place, sometimes it is not there at all), just a white background, and the text is all over the place.Has anyone got any idea what could be wrong with the page on nanna's machine, or what settings need to be looked st?Thanks for any advice.

Thanks, sheepdog.Unfortunately, mine has been doing this for a day or two now.

Ever since clearing the cache in my browser (the latest version of Google Chrome), whenever I am logged out and try to log in to the Xisto - Support site again, I get the following: Underneath it has two buttons saying: "Proceed anyway" and "Back to safety". Why is this happening, I do not see why Xisto's security certificate would be no longer good (By the way, the browser tab says "SSL Error"). It works when I click "Proceed anyway", but I would rather avoid the issue. Can anyone tell me what i need to do to make the security certificate work again? Thank you.

I find it a bit questionable when someone claims to be born with martial arts skills of different martial arts. The reason I am saying this is because any form of martial arts (and there are lots of them) takes years to perfect the techniques, and if someone wants to become a master at any of them, it usually leads to a life long of discipline, study and practice. They are not the skills you just "acquire", all techniques have to be taught, analysed and practised thoroughly, so the term "I was born with the skills" might be something like "a slight exaggeration". Also, (you do not seem to mention your age), claiming you are "good at them" might be a very relative thing, depending on: Under which circumstances you used your "skills" How good and pure the execution of your techniques really is The speed and accuracy with which you execute your techniques (both in attack and defence) I, too, used to have a student who had studied Tae Kwon Do for about six months and as a result thought "she was dangerous".In her case, these things could easily be forgiven since: She was only 8 years old at the time It (of course) felt good to her having punched or kicked someone and getting them to the floor or having defended herself against a punch or a kick It must have felt good to her winning during a one to one sparring exercise However, to put especially points 2 and 3 into their right context: in both cases, it will have concerned someone of her own age, size, weight and ability.Furthermore, these exercises are always supervised by a master and the techniques to be used are always limited to the techniques and skills they have already learned, nothing further. Let us also no forget, one of the greatest martial artists ever, the great Bruce Lee, was, although he was a top class master at his untimely death at the age of 32, was still learning, studying, observing people, doing general strength and fitness exercises in order to keep maintaining and improving his skills. His skills were, above that, a combination of different martial arts, for example, one minute he would execute Kung Fu kicking, punching and grabbing techniques, while, a second later, he would dance around his opponent like a boxer, or pull an opponent over his shoulder as it is done in Judo. This combination of all styles was his invention which he turned into his own style called Jeet Kune Do (the way of the intercepting fist). In an interview on television, he once claimed "I am not one style, I am all styles", a claim which he could rightfully make, as that was really the case. Not only had he combined elements of all kinds of martial arts, he also invented his own techniques, such as the "one inch punch", in which he punches an opponent without swinging his arm, without a step (or more) towards his opponent, just a punch while standing still, and still developing the power to get an opponent to the floor. Then, before going on to a brief explanation of Jiu Jitsu, you claim "you know the styles anyway", well, I am not so sure about the thoroughness of your knowledge, if you refer to one style as "some of them skills that Jackie Chan does". Now, about Jiu Jitsu: There is the old and original Japanese martial art called Jiu Jitsu, and there is also a much more recent Brazilian style called Jiu Jitsu. In a nutshell, Japanese Jujutsu will help you develop: Efficient and effective striking techniques Excellent wrist and joint locking and choking techniques Great ways to throw your opponent In other words, it is a bit like a combination between Judo (throwing, locking and choking techniques) and Karate (striking techniques).The Brazilian style is very similar, with two differences: There are a lot of acrobatic moves in it The main aim is to try and get the opponent to the ground and then apply chokes or holds to get the opponent into submission The acrobatic elements also make the Brazilian Jiu Jitsu style can be used as a spectacular display that looks a lot like choreography, and, as for the fighting itself, there is a lot of ground work involved. Hope you found this post enlightening, and feel free to reply if you wish to continue this discussion.

I was wondering if it is possible to embed video files into posts on this forum. I have a .3gp file (filmed with my mobile phone) which I also put onto my Facebook page. It is too large to upload (2.79 Mb), but Facebook does give you an embed code. I tried the tags, the URL tags and the MEDIA tag, but none of it is working. Since it is a short film, I do not really wish to upload it to Youtube, although I believe it is possible to embed Youtube videos in the posts here. Just for reference, I will show the code here which Facebook gives to embed a video. <object width="320" height="240" ><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true" /><param name="movie" value="http:///V/?_fb_noscript=1; /><embed src="http:///V/?_fb_noscript=1; type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" width="320" height="240"></embed></object> If anyone has an idea of how to use the code to embed this film clip, please let me know. Thank you.

The whelping box has been adjusted now: The mesh on the sides has been covered, making it warmer and darker The floor is adequately covered wih blankets, sheets and newspaper will be added now No more draught can come in and the door will not be an escape option to the puppies. Dido is on day 57 now, getting a bit slower than usual, and also a bit more restless, on top of that she has also began to secrete a bit of milk from time to time. The time has now come to monitor her closely and take her temperature regularly because I feel the birth of the puppies is getting very near. Unfortunately it is Diwali now, and there are lots and lots of fireworks going off in the neigbourhood, which seems to lead to some increased anxiety for our poor Dido, which is not really helping. Now, all we can do now is wait, and go on wondering, until it happens, what things will be like, such as: How many puppies Will things go well Will all the puppies be all right Will the puppies look like the mum or the dad Will they all be black (no guarantee that, when two black labradors mate, all the puppies will be black) Fortunately it is not long before we will have an answer to all these questions now.I really hope and pray all goes well for the mum and the babies.